けい / てい confusion

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1

I have many kanji where I get confused about whether it’s read けい or てい. This is because these are very similar, and WK usually uses the mnemonics cake and tater tots for them which are both food items. So I can usually recall the mnemonic but then my brain goes like… was it cake or tater tots I’m eating here?

For example I literally just got confused between the readings of these very similar looking kanji:

提: You want to present your show and tell of cake/tater tots to the class. You raise your hand, the teacher calls on you, and you submit the cake/tater tots for her and the class’s approval. […]

掲: The reason you display it is to get some cake/tater tots. In this prison, if you display your spoon deftly enough, the wardens bring you some cake/tater tots as a reward. […]

Can you guess from context which of the two these mnemonics are trying to hint towards? My brain can’t, so I just failed that review :sweat_smile:

(An additional issue for me, as a European, is that I’d never heard of tater tots before WK :smiling_face_with_tear:)

So anyway, I’d suggest coming up with some different mnemonic hook for てい, so it’s clearly distinct from けい.

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てい is for Taylor Swift

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I would rather eventually remember with representative vocab that I am used to. Describing Kanji and sounds in terms of vocabularies.

I think cake :shortcake: is OK, but I don’t like the sound of tater tots.

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てい is the sound of a bus stop (バス停・ばすてい), like the one Totoro waits the cat-bus under the rain.

けい is the sound of the police (警察・けいさつ), like in those police cars with 警察 written in big bold characters.

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take a look at the 正 radical in 提. It looks more like 定, just without the roof part. I think it gets the reading from there.

In general, I have noticed that a surprising number of kanji just take the reading from one of their radicals, which help a lot in remembering them for me

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Sméagol: “What’s taters? Precious, what’s taters? Huh?”

Sam: “Po-ta-toes! Boil them, mash them, stick them in a stew. Lovely big golden chips with a nice piece of fried fish.”